


Mi Casa Es Tu Casa

by Goldy



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Betty is homeless I guess, Canon Compliant, F/M, Jughead fell out of a window, Missing Scene, but he seems fine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-23
Updated: 2019-06-23
Packaged: 2020-05-18 09:00:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19331353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Goldy/pseuds/Goldy
Summary: Set during 3x17, The Raid. Betty finds Jughead post Gargoyle den raid. Gladys invites Betty to stay for breakfast. It goes as well as you would expect.**If he has to live in a world where his mom has come back to run the drug trade in Riverdale and she bought the Cooper house and Jughead burned down his trailer to stop her and her gang almost got him killed… well, at least he kind of, sort of gets to live with Betty now.





	Mi Casa Es Tu Casa

It's almost dawn when Jughead makes it back up to his room.

 

Not that he thinks of it as "his" room. As far as he is concerned, it's still Betty's room. There are boxes of her stuff tucked into the corner, half-packed with books, makeup, and clothes. The walls are still lined with her posters. Her desk is cluttered with her textbooks, her homework and photos of her family and friends. The bed is still made up with her sheets – the sheets are _pink_ and there are _flowers_ delicately etched into the pillowcases.

 

"You've gone soft, Jones," he mutters to himself as he sits down on the edge of the bed ( _Betty’s_ bed). It's getting harder to maintain his image - loner, Serpent leader, born on Southside, the wrong side of the tracks – who sleeps in a bed with pink sheets and a pillow stuffed with goose feathers.

 

Oh yeah, and he kind of lives with his girlfriend now. Or she lives with him? She _says_ she’s living with Veronica, but that’s not a perfect solution right now since, as far as they know, Hiram Lodge remains a mob boss whose wife just tried to have him killed. So Betty still spends most of her time at her house (the _Jones’_ house). With him.

 

He sees that as being a fair balance, though. If he has to live in a world where his mom has come back to run the drug trade in Riverdale and she bought the Cooper house and Jughead burned down his trailer to stop her and her gang almost got him killed… well, at least he kind of, sort of gets to live with Betty now.

 

He shrugs off his serpent jacket. It slides from his shoulders, to the bed, and then onto the floor. He sucks in a breath and winces. That _hurt_.

 

Gritting his teeth, he pulls off his shirt and then his undershirt. That hurts more and he can't quite muffle his small moan.

 

"Oh my god, Jughead, what happened?"

 

He looks up. It’s Betty. He hasn’t bothered to turn on the lights and all he sees is her silhouette framed in the doorway. She gently closes the door behind her and then pads across the floor. Moonlight and ambient lighting from outdoors play across her face.

 

She crouches down in front of him. She has the sense to whisper, but her words are still a little too loud, her voice a little too fast: "You said you were going to be careful. You said that you were bringing Archie, that you had backup that - "

 

He puts up a hand, tries to intervene, "Betty-"

 

"I knew I should have gone with you," she continues furiously.

 

He is _very_ thankful that she wasn’t. He decides not to tell her that. “I’ve had worse,” he says instead. “Remember Penny?”

 

Betty does not look reassured. Her eyes roam from his neck, across his chest, down his arms. "What happened?"

 

Before he can answer, she's moved to the closet ( _her_ closet) and rifles around. She comes back with a medical kit and pulls out gauze in one hand, rubbing alcohol in the other.

 

He instinctively shrinks away. He is pretty sure that all that… stuff… is going to make him hurt more before it makes him feel better. “It’s fine. I’m fine.”

 

She snorts. "Okay, yeah, that's obvious. It looks like you went five rounds with Archie in the boxing ring."

 

Jughead sighs and decides to tell her the truth. "I fell out of a second story window."

 

Betty dabs rubbing alcohol on a cotton ball. She stops and stares at him. "You _fell_ out of a window?"

 

He shifts uncomfortably. "Things with the Gargoyles got a little out of hand."

 

Betty has finished applying rubbing alcohol to the cotton balls and bites down on her bottom lip as if trying to decide which of his many cuts and wounds to start with first. She evidently decides on his arms because she heads towards a particularly large gash on his bicep. Jughead flinches and tries to duck out of the way, but she’s too fast for him. One hand goes to his shoulder, holding him in place, and the other hand presses the cotton ball to the gash on his arm. Jughead groans. It _hurts_. It really, really _hurts._

 

Betty does an admirable job of ignoring his moaning. "How out of hand, Jug?"

 

She pulls back the cotton ball, applies some gauze. The pain in his bicep fades to a dull ache. Jughead swallows and eyes the cotton balls with trepidation. "There were more of them than I expected. And they… they had guns."

 

Betty moves on to his chest, swabbing at him with another cotton ball. He hisses. She looks up and her gaze is shocked. "Guns?"

 

Jughead nods. "She supplied them."

 

He doesn't need to tell her who "she" is.

 

"This is serious."

 

"I know."

 

"You could have been killed."

 

He shifts uncomfortably. "For what it's worth," he manages, "I don't think she would actually kill me."

 

He's not so certain the same would have held true for his serpents. Or Archie. Or Mad Dog.

 

Betty sets down the gauze and the cotton ball. She crawls onto his lap and puts her arms around his waist, nestling her head into the crick of his neck.

 

His back cries out in pain, his wounds stretch and sting, but he grits his teeth together and wraps his arms around her. The pain fades.

 

"You should go to a hospital," she murmurs against his neck.

 

He breathes her in, closes his eyes. "And have to explain what we were doing? You know I can't.”

 

"Then we should tell your dad."

 

"No. Betty - " He nudges her until he can look her in the yes. "For the first time in his whole life, things are going well for him. I can't bring him into this. I can't. I just need to regroup. Think about my next move."

 

She nods, her eyes hardening. "Okay, Jug. Okay. We'll think of something."

 

He draws her back against him. “Plus,” he says weakly, “I get to have you play at being nursemaid.”

 

“I have been getting practice since Archie started boxing,” Betty says thoughtfully. “Although he doesn’t squirm or complain nearly as much as you do.”

 

“Hey,” Jughead says, “never have I ever pretended to be as manly and stoic as Archie Andrews. That is a bar that ordinary mortals cannot meet. Yet you love me any way.”

 

She laughs softly, lips brushing against his cheek. “I do.”

 

 

****

 

They sleep for a few hours. When Jughead wakes up, sun is streaming in through the room. He groans and rolls over, throwing his arm across his forehead to cover his eyes. If possible, he feels even _worse_. His skin feels like it has been pierced with a thousand needles and his back is screaming in agony.

 

Betty is no longer curled up next to him. He rolls onto his side and props himself up on an elbow. His eyes are crusty and swollen, but he forces them open, gritting his teeth together.

 

From outside in the hall, he hears his dad's voice, "Oh… Betty, uh, hi."

 

"Hi, Mr. Jones!" comes the reply. She sounds entirely too cheerful given how little sleep they had.

 

He hears footsteps down the hall and then the bathroom door opening and closing. A few moments later, the shower comes on.

 

There's a knock at his door. Jughead clears his throat. "What?"

 

His dad pops his head in. He is already dressed in his sheriff's uniform. The uniform is slightly rumpled like FP washed it and then left it to dry in a heap on the floor. "I, um, I just wanted to…" he trails off awkwardly, and steps into the room. He closes the door behind him. "Is Betty living with us now?"

 

Jughead sits up against the headboard, carefully tugging the bedcovers with him so that his dad doesn't see the scrapes and cuts across his chest and arms.

 

"It's her house," says Jughead defensively.

 

"Right," says his dad. There's another pause, and then: "Are you kids being careful?"

 

Jughead blinks. “What?”

 

"It's just, you know, with what happened to Polly, and -"

 

"Dad -"

 

"And Betty's mom, when she was young, I don’t want to see you kids-"

 

" _Dad_ ," Jughead says, more loudly. His cheeks are burning. He grits out, "Yes, we are being careful."

 

"Okay then," says FP. "That's good. Alice and I…. What I mean to say is, that's… that's more than I was at your –“

 

“ _Please,_ dad, I beg you, do not finish that sentence –”

 

“-anyway,” says FP, “that’s all I wanted to know. That’s good,” he repeats. More awkwardly, he says: “Of course Betty can stay here as long as she likes."

 

Jughead still can't bring himself to look at him.

 

FP clears his throat. "So I'll just…." He opens the door and disappears down the hall, boots clunking loudly along the floor.

 

Jughead sags in relief and flops back against his pillows. He never, ever wants to have _that_ conversation again.

 

***

 

Betty is still in the bathroom when Jughead drags himself downstairs for breakfast. His serpent jacket is covered in dirt and broken glass. He will have to get it cleaned before he can wear it again. Instead he is wearing a white t-shirt a plaid zip-up sweater that he found in a garbage bag thrown into the corner of his room ( _Betty’s_ room). Both items smelled worn and perhaps just the wrong side of “mouldy,” but he decided they were clean enough for school.

 

He isn't surprised to find his mother in the kitchen. There is a fresh pot of coffee brewing and bacon sizzling on the stove.

 

"Good morning," she says brightly, "hungry?"

 

Jughead gingerly takes a seat at the dining room table. He forces himself not to wince as he sits down. _Don't show weakness_. Gladys certainly does not look like she was up half the night. She doesn’t seem at all concerned that her teenage son conducted a raid on her drug hang-out. She does not appear at all phased that she is the new drug king in the same town where her husband is the sheriff and her son is actively plotting ways to end her business and get her out of town.

 

So Jughead forces a smile. "Starved," he says, which is maybe one of the biggest lies he’s ever told. He does _not_ like to lie when it comes to his stomach.

 

"I made pancakes," says Gladys. "Those were your favourite when you were young."

 

"He still likes them," says a voice from the stairs. It's Betty. She enters the dining room, wet hair pulled tightly into a ponytail.

 

“Ah… Betty,” says Gladys. Her smile dims just a little bit. “I see you are still… here. In my house.”

 

The last sentence sits heavily. There is a moment of awkward silence. Betty freezes and shoots Jughead a questioning look.

 

_Should I go?_ she seems to say, eyes darting to him and then to the door.

 

He shakes his head. _Please don’t leave me alone with her_ , he thinks in her direction. _Please don’t make me have to live out this messed up nuclear family fantasy on my own._ He holds her gaze, hopes his message has got through. Surely they have reached that couple level where they can communicate without words. Surely they have been together long enough than she can look into his eyes and understand exactly what he’s –

 

“Maybe I should…” Betty begins.

 

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Gladys cuts in. She points to the table. “Sit. Please. It’s time I got to know my son’s girlfriend. Especially if she is going to be sleeping over regularly.”

 

“I’m actually staying with the Lodges,” says Betty, but she takes a seat next to Jughead.

 

“Hmm,” says Gladys, non-committal. She returns to the stove.

 

Jughead reaches for Betty’s hand under the able. He gives it a squeeze. “We have to work on our non-verbal communication,” he murmurs to her.

 

She squeezes his hand back. “Sorry,” she says, “your eyes went a little cross-eyed, and then you started blinking… I didn’t know what you were trying to tell me.”

 

“That’s okay,” he says, “we’ll work on it.” She shoots him a questioning look. “The non-verbal communication thing. We’ll work on it.”

 

Gladys turns off the stove. Glass chinks as she prepares their plates in the kitchen. Jughead is beginning to feel nauseous. The smell of bacon is _not_ helping – and isn’t that a disturbing thought? He’s never turned down bacon before. Maye he shouldn’t have brushed off Betty’s suggestion to go the hospital. He doesn’t _think_ he broke anything last night, but his neck and back hurt and his eyes are starting to water…

 

Betty gives his hand another squeeze like she can tell that he’s starting to fade. He closes his eyes and tries to focus only that – her hand in his, the rubbing of her thumb over his knuckles, the way she smells when she’s freshly showered….

 

“Here we are,” says Gladys. Jughead opens his eyes as she sets a plate down in front of him heaving with bacon and with pancakes.

 

The smell is overwhelming. His stomach twists. But Gladys is sitting down across from them with her own plate, her own mug of coffee. She takes a sip of her coffee, slowly, deliberately, eyes on him the entire time, lips curled upwards in a small smile. To the outsider, she would look like a mother proud that she had time to spoil her only son and his girlfriend before school.

 

Jughead knows better.

 

He forces himself to release Betty’s hand although it feels like letting go of his lifeline. He reaches for his fork, cuts a piece of pancake and shoves it into his mouth. It feels like lead sliding down his throat. “Delicious,” he forces himself to say, watching Gladys the whole time. “Thank you, mom.”

 

“Yes, thanks,” Betty echoes also digging into her pancakes.

 

Jughead finds that if he keeps the pieces small, he can just about manage to keep them down without gagging.

 

“So Betty,” his mother says. She leans back in her chair, relaxed.  “FP only has good things to say about you and your influence on Jughead. He tells me you’re top of your class at Riverdale High.”

 

Betty shifts. “Doing well in school has always been important to me,” she says, “although it’s been… more difficult recently.”

 

“Betty’s always been the smartest kid in our grade,” Jughead volunteers. “Ever since we were little.”

 

Betty smiles and turns her head to look at him fondly. “I don’t know if I am the ‘smartest,’” she says, still smiling fondly. “But I do actually turn in my homework.”

 

Jughead loves when she looks at him like that. It still gives him a rush – a rush that says that _this_ girl, Betty Cooper, _the_ Betty Cooper, loves him, Jughead Jones. Not Archie, not some jock with a 4.0 GPA, but _him_.

 

“Homework is overrated,” says Glady. She picks up a piece of bacon and crunches it between her teeth. “It measures how well you are wiling to conform. Not intelligence.”

 

“True,” says Betty, “but doing homework means keeping up my grades, and keeping up my grades means getting a college scholarship. Which, thanks to some… decisions my mother has made recently, happens to be something that I need.”

 

Gladys finishes chewing her bacon. “College,” she says thoughtfully. “The Jones’ family doesn’t exactly have a long history of getting higher education. Usually they find themselves pursuing… other career paths.”

 

Jughead shifts uncomfortably. He _really_ does not want to have this conversation. In fact, he has spent the last few months actively _avoiding_ this conversation. Decisions about college, about university… that’s still far off, that’s still the _future_. A future rapidly barrelling towards him, but still the future. And Gladys is right. Their family doesn’t have the greatest track record when it comes to post-secondary education.

 

“The serpents won’t hold Jughead back from going to college if that’s what you’re implying,” says Betty hotly. “Not after everything Jug has given them the last few years. Besides, I’m not going anywhere without him, and I can guarantee you, Ms. Jones, that Jughead is not going to hold me back.” Betty looks down at her plate, moves a piece of pancake around with her fork. “He wouldn’t.”

 

Jughead feels momentarily tongue-tied. He hasn’t had the luxury of thinking this far ahead – had never let himself think that far ahead. How could he? His duty was to the serpents. His family was the serpents. But Betty was also right. Anywhere she went, he would follow. There was no other option. There was no world where he would live in without Betty Cooper. So he didn’t think about it. He pushed it out of his mind. He told himself that was for the future – for decisions he didn’t have to make yet.

 

It’s almost a relief, truth be told, that Betty has figured it out for him.

 

“She’s right,” Jughead finds himself saying. “Wherever Betty goes, I go.”

 

Betty looks a little smug this time as she digs back into her breakfast. Gladys sits back in her chair, looking back and forth between them.

 

“I supposed you’ll have to go far,” she says slowly, “to make sure that you end up where no one knows where you come from.”

 

Betty freezes, her fork hovered in mid-air. “I’m sorry?”

 

“Your father,” says Glady. She calmly takes a sip of coffee. “The Black Hood. Everyone within 60 miles of this town knows who he is. Knows who you are.” She smirks. “How do you think I was able to afford your house, Betty? No one else wanted to buy the home belonging to Riverdale’s notorious serial killer.”

 

The colour is draining from Betty’s face and Jughead can suddenly hear his heart pounding in his ears. _No_ , this is _not okay_. Going after him, going after his serpents – that’s _one_ thing. That’s something he can handle. But go after Betty like this? Shove her fingers in her deepest wounds, her sharpest scars?

 

“What I heard is that you still visit him,” Gladys murmurs. Betty’s fork drops back to her plate and she looks down at her lap. “That’s right,” Gladys continues. “People in this town talk. Everyone in this goddam town _talks_. I remember when you were young, Betty. You always took after him, your father.”

 

“Stop it,” says Jughead. He says it quietly, but his throat is burning, his eyes are aching. This is _wrong_ – this is _not_ okay. His job is to make sure that Betty feels safe – safe, with him. His mother can’t take that away. He won’t let her.

 

“I’ve seen the logbooks, Jughead. It doesn’t take much to loosen tongues in this place,”” Gladys says, but she’s still looking at Betty – Betty who is studiously looking down at her breakfast, her face pale and her fists clenched together. “At first she only saw him once or twice. And then it was once a month. Then twice a month. Now once a week – sometimes twice a week.”

 

“He’s my father,” Betty whispers.

 

“You’re right about that, girl,” Gladys says, and she sounds triumphant. She takes another sip of coffee. “And how long will it take you to wash that stain away?”

 

Jughead’s fist pounds down on the table. The dishes shudder. Some water slops over the edge of his glass.

 

“You cannot speak with her that way,” says Jughead. His breath is coming out in short pants. “I won’t let you.”

 

Gladys quirks an eyebrow as if to say: _What are you going to do about it?_

But Betty says, “Jug, it’s fine, I can handle it. People at school have said worse.”

 

“I know you can handle it,” says Jughead. “That’s not the issue.” He holds his mother’s gaze, trying to put all of the disgust and anger that he can into it. She does not back down. He grabs Betty’s hand. “Come on, let’s go to school.”

 

Betty presses her lips together, but lets him drag her to her feet and lead her to the door.

 

He does not look back. He does not say goodbye.

 

***

 

The day is mild and sunny. Jughead holds Betty’s hands for a few blocks but then shoves his hands into his pockets. He still hurts _everywhere_ but the anger is fueling him. He wants to punch something. He wants to take Betty and run away and never come back. He hates this damn town. He hates what this town has put them through. He hates that he can’t even protect Betty in his ( _her_ ) own home.

 

Betty is quiet, contemplative. She doesn’t say anything for the first few minutes of their walk. Finally, about halfway to school, she says, “Jug, I’m okay. Really.”

 

He stops and faces her. He picks up one of her hands, turns it over until he sees the indentation of her nails dug into the palms. The anger threatens to overwhelm him again – that _his_ mother had the gall to go down that route, to _pick_ on her the way that she had…  


Betty pulls her hand out of his grip and then reaches for him, cupping his cheek with her hand. “Hey,” she says intently. “I mean it. I’ve had worse.”

 

He closes his eyes. He lets her comfort him even though a part of him feels that it should be the other way around. “I’m sorry,” he whispers.  


“Jug,” her hand moves from his cheek, to his shoulder, and then her lips are pressing against the corner of his lips. Her breath is warm on his face. She presses her forehead to his. “She was just looking out for you, in her own way. And she’s right. I am the daughter of Riverdale’s most notorious serial killer. It’s almost… motherly, that she was concerned.”

 

“Don’t say that.”

 

“It’s true though.” She pulls back and he opens his eyes to see her gnawing on her bottom lip, gazing thoughtfully in the distance. “I don’t think I should spend the night anymore.” She pauses and then she smiles. “At least, not until we get rid of her.”

 

“Have you got something in mind?”

 

The smile becomes self-assured, even smug. A smile that says that Betty Cooper has thought of something and nothing is going to get in her way. “Maybe. What she can’t do is scare me away, Jug. I meant what I said in there.”

 

“Me too,” he says and he feels his heart lifting, the anger fading a little bit. He’s still in pain, and bruised beyond recognition, and it’s possible his back will never be the same again, but he has _Betty_ , Betty who looks like a cat who has seized a mouse between her teeth and is going to play with it before she kills it.

 

He feels something like hope brimming inside of him. Like maybe there is a way through all of this after all.

 

He takes her hand. “Come on,” he says. “We’ve got to get to school. You have that scholarship to get. And I have your homework to copy before first period.”


End file.
